


Neon Lights, Bloody Fights

by verynotconcise



Category: The Maze Runner (Movies), The Maze Runner Series - All Media Types, The Maze Runner Series - James Dashner
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Mentions of other characters - Freeform, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-02-06
Updated: 2018-02-06
Packaged: 2019-03-14 16:24:43
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,496
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13593906
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/verynotconcise/pseuds/verynotconcise
Summary: Thomas is a freshman in college, Newt is an exchange student and Minho wants Thomas to join the track team.





	Neon Lights, Bloody Fights

**Author's Note:**

> wow so this fic wasn't supposed to take as long as it did (i wanted to finish this by mid january) & it wasn't supposed to be as long as it is (the goal was <10k) but life happened and a lot of things impeded my writing ability and speed. i thought of deleting this whole chunk of junk but my friend told me that i shouldn't and basically tolerated my whiny ass as i continued slaving away so thanks sy, you're the real mvp. also, this is to mend my shattered heart after watching the death cure yesterday. ;-; (i cried so much i was embarrassed to be myself lmao)
> 
> please excuse any grammar mistakes and inaccuracies of what happens, i don't really know what i'm writing either lol.
> 
> title taken from the lyrics of Pim Stone's Neon Lights, have been one of my favourite songs to listen to for months now ^-^

**One**

  
Thomas meets Newt at exactly 8:19AM on a rainy Monday morning.

Thomas settles down in the last row of the lecture theatre 5 minutes to 8, thrumming with excitement and energy. The first lecture of the first semester of his first year at college, how great is that? He’d been anticipating college since halfway through his high school education where he’d been a wallflower, never quite fitting in with his peers but thankfully never out of it enough to get bullied. No doubt part of it was due to Minho’s influence as well. Vice-captain of the football team, well built and always friendly to everyone except the people who cross him. Minho was his best friend and Thomas knew that Minho was also a big reason why he was able to pull through high school and make it to a decent college together. But now that he was in college, it was as good a place to start over and make more friends, ‘find yourself’ as Minho put it.

Thomas takes a cautious sip of the coffee he bought, watching students stream into the lecture theatre in pairs and groups and feeling slightly lonely. But all that was forgotten as soon as the lecturer - a man with a balding spot on his head and a slightly bloated stomach - started to introduce himself as well as the module content.

Thomas is in the middle of flipping through his brand new textbook when someone walks in and slumps one seat away from him. Thomas stares.

The guy has his blond hair tied in an unbecoming bun, on the verge of falling apart. His long shirt only emphasised his lanky frame.

The man breathes out heavily before looking at Thomas.

“Did I miss anything important?” he asks. He has an accent that Thomas struggled to put a finger on.

“He talked about the assessment criteria for this module, as well as office hours and module content.”

“Nothing important then.” the man says happily, removing his bag and taking out the most battered looking laptop that Thomas had ever seen. When he turned again, he caught Thomas still staring. “What?”

“Lecturer’s using the eighth edition.”

The man raises a brow, “And I have the fifth edition downloaded. Not much of a difference, just less pages and some corrections.”

“You don’t -” Thomas licks his lips nervously, “You’re not going to buy the textbook?”

The man laughs, not loud enough for others to hear. “You must be a freshman, am I right to say that?”

“Yes, I am. What about it?” Thomas frowns.

“Well, no one buys an actual physical copy of the textbooks. How much did yours cost?” he nodded towards the copy in front of Thomas, sharp edges and an unmarred spine, “I bet that it cost enough money to eat for a week.”

Thomas remains silent, not wanting to admit that the man was right.

“Don’t worry, mate. I did the same thing when I was a freshie too before I realised how dumb I was skimping on my meals for heavy books I used as door stoppers during the term. Sold all of them right after the finals, thank god for that.”

“You’re not a first year student?”

“I’m a second year exchange student.”

“Oh,” Thomas pauses, then, “where do you come from?”

“France.” the man says seriously, so seriously that Thomas believes him at once. Thomas nods once, but the man continues staring at Thomas with that serious expression, as if waiting for Thomas to do something, so he nods again. Suddenly, the man starts laughing, eyes going up into small crescents. “I’m kidding. You didn’t actually believe that, did you?”

Yes. “No.”

“Bloody hell, you actually believed me.” the man sobs, “Good god. That was hilarious. Never met one like you.” the man breathes out, takes a peek at Thomas before biting his lower lip to suppress anymore laughter.

Thomas furrows his brows. He doesn’t really enjoy being the butt of the joke. “So if you’re not from France, then where are you from?”

“I’m British.” the guy finally says. Oh, now that he’s said it, the accent finally makes sense to Thomas. “My name is Newt.”

“Nude? Like naked?” Thomas asks incredulously. The man pulls a face before laughing again.

“Aren’t you a horndog.” the man chuckles, pushing Thomas’ forehead back with his index finger. “Not _Nude_. Newt.”

“Like the lizard?”

“I stand corrected. A charismatic horndog. Is that how you get all the gals?”

Thomas wrinkles his nose in distaste, “Who even says ‘gals’ in this day and age?”

“A lot of people, you’d be surprised.”

Thomas is surprised all right.

“What’s your name, anyway?” Newt asks.

Thomas hesitates for a brief moment before he remembers: new school, new him. “Thomas. My name is Thomas.”

Newt smiles, friendly and approachable, “I guess that I’ll be seeing you around, Thomas.”

Thomas isn’t really sure that he wants to see the man around, but he nods anyway. Better to be polite than come off as rude in the first lecture, even if he tries to keep all forms of further contact and conversation with Newt to the bare minimum.

  
**Two**

  
This week, Thomas finds it slightly more difficult to prise himself from the lovely promise of ‘5 more minutes’ tucked under a thick blanket in a rainy weather. Still, he manages to make it on time for lecture, sliding into the first available seat he sees. Needless to say the last row again. It seems that everyone must be feeling the same, because the lecture theatre had been less than half filled when the lecturer decided to start, with little groups of students still streaming in past the 10 minute mark.

Thomas looks around again. There’s blondes, there’s men, no Newt.

Thomas chuckles as he shakes his head. He doesn’t know why he was even trying to find the man after last week’s less than pleasant encounter. Maybe it was him trying to find a familiar face in a sea of unfamiliar ones. Whatever.

The lecturer begins to speed up, and Thomas’ neat handwriting turns to slightly more legible chicken scribbles. All thought of an accented voice and messy blond buns flew out the window.

At the half an hour mark, the lecturer stops the lecture for a brief 5 minute break which Thomas is more than grateful for. The lecture had dived into some pretty complex concepts and Thomas needed the time to go over what was covered. He was in the midst of reading the notes under his breath when someone snickers over his shoulder.

“Gunning for that A plus eh, Thomas?”

Thomas’ head snaps up, finding a very amused Newt standing behind him with a smile like the cat that got the cream. Thomas frowned.

“At least I’m not gunning for that D.”

The moment it’s out of his mouth, he winces. Newt cackles, actually cackles in the fucking lecture theatre. He draws the attention of idle students waiting for lecture to resume, most of them throwing dirty looks at them.

“And whose D are we referring to?” Newt asks in between gasps for breath.

“Does it matter?”

“Yes.” Newt emphasises with a long eye roll, seating himself one seat away from Thomas as he did last week, “Because if we're talking about the old fart’s D, I think I’ll pass.”

Thomas takes a moment to process that and the mental imagery is too much for an 8AM lesson. “You’re disgusting.” Thomas deadpans, wrinkling his nose in distaste. Newt laughs again.

“And you’re boring.”

The lecturer turns on the microphone again, announcing in a dreary voice that he was about to resume the lecture shortly. Thank god for that, if Thomas had to spend even a minute longer talking to Newt, he was sure that the amount of brain cells he was about to lose would ensure his expulsion from the University. Thomas turns away from Newt, resolutely focusing only on the lecturer and his notes and absolutely not looking at the way that Newt had also put on his glasses and typed occasionally on his laptop. No sir.

  
**Three**

  
Thomas receives his first assignment for the term from that dreaded maths module. It’s only a 5 percent assignment, but it has Thomas tearing his hair out day and night with its ridiculously short questions but tedious workings with even more unbelievable numbers. So when Minho invites him to go on a jog that morning, Thomas agrees readily.

“You should join the track team, Tom.” Minho says as they jog round the corner of the lake. Thomas glances at Minho, laughs weakly in between his panting - which is no more than just harsher panting.

“Uh, I don’t think so. I’m so out of shape.”

“So? You’re more in shape than some of the others who’ve joined. We have many freshmen who joined, even some exchangers. It’ll be a good place to network, make new friends, whatever.” When Thomas remains unconvinced, Minho continues, “It’s a recreational sport. You only get selected for the school team if you’re the cream of the crop. No pressure.”

Thomas ponders over it, “I’ll think about it.” he says sincerely, “I don’t know if I’ll be able to commit to the team and juggle my academics at the same time.”

“It’s freshman year, Thomas. If you don’t try anything new now, when will you ever have the time to do it? In your senior year?”

He hates to admit it, but Minho has a point.

“I’ll just think about it okay.” Thomas promises. Minho raises a brow in disbelief. “Really, I will.”

And he does think about it. He thinks about it a lot, so much so that he doesn’t notice when Newt slides into the same seat and watches Thomas amusedly.

“Pondering about the homework?”

Thomas jumps, his hand clutching onto his shirt. “Jesus! Warn a man will you?”

“I’m sorry, it’s just that you looked like you were thinking hard about something, couldn’t bear to disturb your concentration.” Newt smiles at him, innocent and cheery, resting his chin on his palm. That’s when Thomas sees something colourful and out of place against his pale skin.

“You’re injured?” he says, leaning in to get a closer look at the neon yellow plaster carefully pasted on the skin. Toy Story, neat.

“Nah, minor abrasion.” Newt says dismissively, pulling his arm away from Thomas’ view. Thomas nods. This is probably where he asks Newt how he got that bruise, but Thomas doesn’t care enough to do it. Instead, he turns back to his notes, trying to make sense of all the workings that feels like reading latin instead.

  
**Four**

  
Thankfully with the assignment out of the way, Thomas can finally focus on his other modules, which includes maths, maths, and even more maths. Seriously, he’s a physics major, when will he ever touch a physics question this semester?

Thomas taps his feet as he reclines into the sofa seat in the library. Minho is late for their study session and Thomas isn’t even surprised anymore, just disappointed that some bad habits have carried over from high school.

With another impatient sigh, Thomas checks his phone.

**Minho**  
I’m running late, lab partner fucked up the report

And nothing else after that. Thomas pockets his phone with another sigh, rubbing his face tiredly. It’s only week four and he feels utterly drained from lectures and tutorials and everything else in between. He can’t even imagine how he’ll manage to pull through as the semester progresses and workload gets heavier.

After a long moment of silence with his eyes shut, he opens them to find Minho striding into the library.. with Newt by his side. They’re talking and smiling and laughing. What the fuck. What the fuck.

“What the fuck.” is the first thing Thomas says when Minho and Newt stop right in front of him. He didn’t mean to actually say it, but now that it’s out there that’s just too bad then.

“Heya Tommy boy.” Newt says airily. Minho’s smile drops impossibly fast.

“Wait, you two know each other?”

“You know Newt? How do you know him?”

Minho frowns at Thomas. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that? He’s my track teammate.”

Thomas’ gaze falls Newt’s arm where he had that Toy Story plaster, but now that the wound had healed there was nothing but pasty white skin.

“So this was the Thomas you were talking about,” Newt says with an air of wonder and realisation, “I assumed you were talking about a different Thomas, since it’s a common name and all. No offense, Tommy.”

“Tommy.” Minho repeats, looking between Thomas and Newt with a smirk. Thomas groans, shooting Newt a glare. Newt purses his lips when he catches the less than friendly look Thomas gives, for the first time looking anything but carefree and jovial.

“Maybe I should go back, got an early day tomorrow.” Newt says, clapping Minho’s shoulders as he turns around and walks away. “Later.” he says, raising a hand.

Thomas and Minho watch Newt leave before Minho looks unhappily at Thomas. “What was that? First thing you say when we arrive is ‘what the fuck’?”

“I don’t like him.” Thomas replies petulantly.

Minho regards Thomas for a long moment before he asks, “Why don’t you like him? He ever beat you up?”

“What? No.”

“He called you names?”

“No.”

“He pranked you?”

“No. What? No. He -” Thomas stands up abruptly, hands flying all over the place as he scrambles to collect his thoughts, “Newt didn’t bully me, okay? He didn’t. Doesn’t need to bully me for me to dislike him.”

“What?” Minho asks in disbelief, “Tom, you’re being fucking childish. So you’re telling me that you dislike Newt for no good reason? That’s bullshit.”

“I don’t know, he’s just so..” Thomas clenches his fist and grits his teeth, “ugh, you know? Ugh.”

“Okay, this is getting ridiculous.” Minho walks up to Thomas and grabs him by the shoulders, shaking him violently. “Listen up, Thomas, Newt is a cool guy. He’s insanely nice and friendly, and he doesn’t deserve to unreasonable hate you seem to have for him.”

Thomas remains silent, slightly pouty. Minho’s expression softens as he continues in a gentler voice, one he reserves for moments when Thomas is upset and Minho is fulfilling his best friend duties. “So I’m telling you to throw away whatever preconceived impressions you have of him and just try to befriend him, because I think that he could really be good for you, Tom.”

“You didn’t tell me you knew Newt.” Thomas accuses.

“How was I supposed to know that you two had met?” Minho groans, flopping onto the cushions with his hands on his head, “He’s a theatre studies major, not a physics major, for gods sake.”

Thomas freezes, letting that information sink in. Theatre studies. Theatre studies. What was Newt doing in a _linear algebra_ module?

  
**Five**

  
The first indication of a bad day starts with an alarm - or the lack thereof, because his phone battery had died overnight, thanks to his carelessness in not turning the power on. The second indication of a bad day was the heavy downpour that only started the moment he stepped out of his room. And the third indication of a bad day was entering the lecture theatre soaked to the bone and finding Newt in his usual seat.

Thomas quickly makes his way to his seat, refusing to sit elsewhere because that’s his usual seat, if anyone should move it should be Newt and not him. So he stomps over and sits down, turning to Newt with a glare as menacing as he can manage with his hair plastered to his face and shirt sticking to his skin.

“How are you so early.” he hisses. Newt looks at him and then to the clock at the front of the room, big neon red numbers spelling late by 41 minutes.

“I don’t think I’m _that_ early, mate.” Newt replies.

Thomas pinches the bridge of his nose, shutting his eyes painfully tight. “You’re a theatre studies major.”

“And?”

“Theatre studies!” Thomas whispers loudly, eyes popping open and fingers spreading apart mimicking an explosion. Newt nods unsurely, still not following the conversation. “What’re you doing in a linear algebra module, learning about vector spaces and..” he gestures to the lecture slides on Newt’s laptop before he realises that he doesn’t actually have any idea what it was, “whatever the hell this is.”

“Calm down, Tommy. Don’t get your panties in a twist.” Newt says, partly amused partly concerned, “Yes, I’m a theatre studies major. But look, somewhere in my university planning I screwed up and applied for an exchange to a university that doesn’t offer theatre studies, so I’m left to clear my breadth modules here, which honestly doesn’t give me many choices seeing as this is a university more inclined towards the sciences.”

“So why apply here?”

Newt shrugs casually, “I just wanted to visit the states, and where better than California, am I right? Sun’s out, I’m out.”

Thomas sighs, rubbing his temples.

“Do you hate me that much that you want me to go back to Britain?” Newt says with a hint of amusement and hurt in his voice, “I can’t say that I’m surprised but I am disappointed, Tommy. That’s very rude.” he finishes with a frown.

“No! That wasn’t what I meant at all!” Thomas stutters, taking in a deep breath and then glancing unsurely at Newt, watching his reaction. “What I meant was - I’m sorry. I was a jerk to you last week. I didn’t mean it.”

“Yeah. Not gonna lie, you were kind of an arse.”

“Yeah.” Thomas chuckles humourlessly, “I’m sorry. Do you - I mean, I’m going to study with Minho again tomorrow. Do you want to join us?”

Newt ponders on it, visibly weighing his options before he sighs, “Okay.”

Which is how Newt ends up study at the same table as Thomas and Minho the next afternoon. Minho looks pleased with Thomas, although he spends half the time using his laptop to watch cat videos on youtube than actually studying. Newt scribbles away illegibly on scraps of rough paper, using almost every single blank space there is on there. While Thomas… Thomas is..

“You look like shit, Tom.” Minho comments, “Or are you actually constipated?”

Thomas looks up, “What.” he says, not a question.

“Yeah, you do look like you’re in pain, Tommy. What’s the matter?” Newt stretches a bit in his chair to get a better look of Thomas’ work across the table, “Isn’t that our tutorial for next week?”

“Yeah.” Thomas sighs, “It’s so difficult I can feel a migraine forming.”

“Why don’t you just ask Newt for help?” Minho asks, “Didn’t you score like near full marks for that assignment you had last week or something? Or last last week? I don’t remember. But that assignment.”

Newt’s frown deepens as he nudges Minho’s elbow with his own, “Don’t say that.”

‘In front of Thomas’ is unsaid, but clearly implied. Thomas knows, because the average for that assignment was a borderline pass and that was his exact result. Thomas looks back down at his tutorial work, feeling slightly depressed about his newfound knowledge. A theatre studies major scoring nearly twice as much as he did, if he didn’t feel like shit before then he did now.

A kick under the table jolts him from his negative thoughts. He peeks down. It’s Newt’s shoe. When he looks back up, Newt is smiling encouragingly at him.

“If you need any help, just ask away mate.”

Thomas tries to smile back, but the way that Newt’s smile falls slightly tells him that his attempt was unsuccessful.

“But you know who doesn’t look like shit?” Minho pipes up minutes later, closing his laptop shut with a loud click, “Teresa.”

Newt nods in agreement, “I have to agree. The way she looks when she runs is great, but when she finishes first with that gap, that’s even greater.”

Thomas looks between Minho and Newt. “Who?”

“Track teammate, total hottie.” Minho says excitedly, “You should come and visit during next week’s training. You won’t regret it.”

Thomas side-glances at Newt who raises his brows in challenge. Thomas grits his teeth, he isn’t a quitter.

  
**Six**

  
Thomas isn’t a quitter, but sometimes he wishes he was one. It’s cold as hell, he has an itch that he can’t scratch because he’s wearing jeans and with the wind blowing his hair all over his face, he’s tempted to just pull out his hair until he’s bald. Honestly, he doesn’t even want to be sitting at the bleachers waiting for Minho and Newt, he’s got work to do and lecture notes to cry over. But when Minho and Newt jog back to the bleachers during their water break, the smile that envelopes their face makes him feel slightly bad that he was grumbling to himself.

“If it isn’t Tom!” Minho shouts happily, slapping Thomas’ back a few times too hard. “What an unpleasant surprise seeing your face around here.”

Newt nods enthusiastically as he takes big sips of water.

“You make it sound like I’m hermit or something.” Thomas wrinkles his nose. Minho barks a laugh.

“You said that, not me.” Minho says, “But seriously, what brought you out of your cave, man? I offered you pizza that once and you were just like, ‘nah’. Who says no to pizza?”

Newt looks weirdly at Thomas, as if he can’t believe that ever happened as well. Before Thomas can say anything in defense, Minho continues as loud as ever.

“Oh my god, is this because of Teresa? You came to look at Teresa didn’t you?” Minho says, snapping his fingers in realisation. With how loudly he speaks, Minho might as well be shouting into a microphone. The guy with weirdly angry looking eyebrows a distance away looks up from where he’s sitting, pointedly glaring at Thomas.

“Shut the fuck up, Minho.” Thomas hisses, feeling his face burn with embarrassment. Newt laughs.

“If you’re here to see her then I’m sorry to inform you that she’s not here today, mate. Said she was feeling under the weather.”

“Oh.” Thomas says, oddly disappointed.

“But since you’re here, how about we get some dinner in our tummy anyway?” Newt suggests. Minho perks up at the promise of food.

“Let’s get chinese food.” Minho says.

Which is how they end up in Minho and Thomas’ shared room a little over an hour later, with Newt and Minho fresh from the shower and Thomas being the poor delivery man.

“I don’t claim to always be right,” Minho says in between bites of his noodles, “but if you say that this chao mian isn’t the best thing you’ve ever tasted, then you’re wrong.”

“You said that about the pasta Alby cooked last week.” Newt points out.

“Well, yes, because that was _pasta_. This though,” Minho raises the paper cup in his hand triumphantly, “this chao mian is the best chao mian to ever chao mian.”

“The fried dumplings aren’t too bad either.” Thomas adds.

Minho nods. “It’s settled. We are doing this after every training. We’re going to sweat and then gorge ourselves on chinese food. This is not up for discussion.”

No one complains anyway. They eat finish the rest of their food with playful banter, sometimes with food particles flying across the space between.

“Pretty neat place you guys have here,” Newt comments after they’re done eating, looking around in wonder, “very cozy.” he says as he pokes his toe into the carpet between their beds. Thomas cringes, wondering if he should tell Newt about the numerous times they’ve spilled cola and beer on that, but eventually deciding that ignorance was a bliss.

“Thanks, we take turns to clean the room. It’s Thomas’ turn this week.” Minho says.

“I cleaned the room last week.” Thomas argues.

“Which you did a wonderful job at, congrats. That’s why you should do it again this week.”

Thomas frowns but declines to push the topic, taking a sip of his lukewarm coffee instead. “Who do you room with, Newt?”

“I don’t room with anyone. I’m an exchange student, so I get a single room for some reason.”

“What? Isn’t it more expensive?”

“Yeah. A load of shit if you ask me. This university is a money leech.”

“College.” Minho corrects, “We call it college over here.”

“Oh fuck off, Minho.”

“But well, it’s cool that you have a single room, you know? You get to jerk off in privacy.”

Thomas chokes on his coffee. Newt rushes to pat his back before Thomas nods that _okay, I’m okay, not dying anymore, thanks._

“I talk about privacy and the first thing that comes to mind is wanking off?” Newt says with a hint of amusement in his voice, “Should I be worried about touching your things?”

“Okay, jerking off with a peace of mind is a big plus. Smaller plusses include walking around naked and not having to sleep on your side.”

“What do you mean by not having to sleep by your side?” Thomas asks.

“I mean I don’t have to worry that I raised my flag in my sleep, you know. You’ll never know if I did if I sleep on my side.”

Thomas coughs. Newt laughs heartily.

“Just think of dead puppies or something.”

“It doesn’t work for me, dude. It’s like a fucking stick that won’t go away.”

Fuck. This was all brand new information that Thomas never knew that he never needed and never wanted to know. Thanks a lot, Minho. He would need at least 10 litres of brain bleach before he could get a good sleep and wake up without his traitorous thoughts bringing this up ever again. He tunes out of the conversation, opting to sip his coffee and think about more important things, such as whether he should leave the room right now.

“Hey Tommy,” Newt snaps him out of his thoughts, “how are you going to spend your break next week?”

“Uhh, studying for the midterms I guess?”

“Hey, yeah, let’s study together.” Minho says happily, raising himself on his elbows on his bed. Thomas furrows his brows as he takes another sip of his coffee. Minho doesn’t even share any module with them, but just studying with Newt alone would be the like studying with a third party - awkwardness personified. So maybe Minho studying with them wasn’t going to be too bad after all.

  
**Seven**

  
Thomas is wrong, as usual. Studying with Minho and Newt turns out to be not so great. In between their studying, Minho talks mostly to Newt about track stuff: gossip, online shopping for shoes they can’t afford to buy, the works. They titter between themselves and it leaves Thomas feeling left out.

To counteract that feeling gnawing at him, he throws himself into his textbooks, highlighting what he thinks is important and practicing all the extra questions. It works surprisingly well, if Thomas does say so himself, because by the time he finishes the last question, he hears his stomach growl extra loudly.

Newt looks up, “Hungry?”

“Yeah. Starving actually.”

“What do you want to eat?”

Thomas blinks. He hadn’t actually planned to eat dinner with Newt. The original plan was to eat some cheap takeout and watch Netflix. But since Newt already asked, Thomas scraps his plan with a tinge of sadness.

“Fast food?” Thomas suggests half-heartedly. Newt shrugs.

“I’m fine with it. How about you, Minho?”

Minho looks up at the mention of his name, slightly confused. “What? Oh. Dinner. Sorry boys, I have a date tonight.”

“What the fuck? Since when?” Thomas asks.

“Since last night. But have fun without me anyway. I know I will.” Minho says with a wink. The audacity.

Thomas looks at Newt, who shrugs casually again. “Looks like it’ll just be me and you tonight, Tommy.”

On hindsight, Thomas kind of wishes he had just refused Newt’s invitation because he was shitting himself at the mere thought of being alone with this guy he is friends with, yet not really. He doesn’t know if they’re at the stage where Newt can be considered his friend or not, and it’s a really weird stage to be in. Like a limbo. He’s spent so much time talking to Newt through Minho that he doesn’t know what to expect being alone with the man himself. It probably showed, because Newt asks him just before they enter his room, “Are you alright?”

“What?”

“A bit spaced out there, aren’t you?”

Thomas shakes his head, trying to clear away his anxious thoughts. “Just tired.”

“Yeah, studying does that to you.” Newt agrees as they step into Thomas’ room, settling down on the bed with their fast food on their laps. “Do you have Netflix?”

“Of course I do.”

“You use your own account or do you leech off other people?”

“My own, of course. I’m not a barbarian.”

Newt laughs while Thomas eyes the large soda drinks wobbling dangerously on the bed.

“Let’s watch Stranger Things 2.” Newt says. Thomas nods his agreement, pressing on the next episode. The night progresses relatively smoothly; they finish their upsize meals quickly and watch the series with few comments, mostly from Newt about the inconsistencies of the storyline. Thomas usually prefers to watch in silence, but there has been something nagging at him.

“Fuck Nancy. Steve deserves better.”

Newt does a double take, taken by surprise. “Woah, woah, what’s with the hate?”

“She was waiting for Jonathan to come to her while she was attached to Steve. That’s emotionally cheating on him.”

Newt purses his lips, “You have a point, but Jonathan isn’t a bad guy either. He took care of Nancy when Steve left her drunk in that party. _And_ he even covered up for Steve. I don’t think you’d be able to do that for the boyfriend of the girl you like, I know I wouldn’t.” Newt sips his drink which is just ice by now, dredging up the last bit of flavoured water noisily from the red bendy straw.

Thomas frowns. He hadn’t actually thought of it, he’d let his annoyance with Nancy cloud his judgement. Newt was right, but he didn’t like not having the last word. “Steve still has the best character development in the series. Ever.”

“That’s right. You know who has the worst character development, though?”

“Who?”

“Dustin.”

Thomas groans extra loudly, hands clenched in a fist as he throws his head back. “Yes. God, _yes_. I thought I was the only one. What the hell was he doing this entire season? He’s like the Ross of Stranger Things 2.”

This time, Newt laughs loudly, a hand over his mouth and eyes shut tightly. It’s a low raspy sound that Thomas finds himself laughing along with not long later, both falling onto each other with crinkles at the sides of their eyes. Truthfully, Thomas doesn’t even find what he said funny, he doesn’t understand why Newt is laughing at it like it’s the greatest joke in the world, but he likes the way that Newt laughs so unrestrainedly.

Time passes in a flash that night, and even if Thomas doesn’t really remember what exactly they talked about, he remembers the little details that - come to think of it - he really doesn’t know why he remembers. Things like how Newt keeps his hair long because he was ‘bloody inspired’ (as he called it) by alternative bands who sing with their face covered by their hair, how Newt prefers his tea with no sugar added because that’s how tea is meant to be drank, Tommy. Their playful banter and carefree laughter lingers in Thomas’ mind long after Newt falls asleep on his bed, mouth agape with a thin trail of drool pooling on his pillow. Thomas grimaces at it, but instead of shaking Newt awake, he pulls the blanket over him and turns off the light, rolling his sleeping bag on the floor. Sleep doesn’t come easily to him that night because of how occupied his thoughts were, cluttered with a deep laughter and a slightly crooked smile.

Minho comes in late that night, almost stepping on Thomas’ face as he strolls in happily.

“What the fuck,” Minho whispers harshly, “are you doing down there?”

Thomas presses a finger to his lips urgently, nodding in Newt’s direction. The man was still deeply asleep, breaths coming out softly and strands of hair falling all over his face.

Minho looks at Newt, back at Thomas, and then back to Newt with his eyes narrowing in confusion. Thomas can understand Minho’s confusion; just a week or two ago Thomas still harboured ill feelings towards the man he let sleep on his bed. It’s weird, but for some inexplicable reason Thomas finds himself at peace with it. Newt was a relatively fun guy to hang around, he knew that now.

Before Minho resigns to sleep, he casts another strange look at Thomas. Thomas turns away from Minho uneasily, facing Newt instead and watching the steady rise and fall of his chest.

 

When Minho announces that he wouldn’t be joining them for dinner after their study session the next day, Newt turns to Thomas with a playful glint in his eyes.

“Okay,” Thomas relents, “but we’re not eating fast food again. Wednesdays are meant for clean eating, I’m not going to have another tyre on this stomach.”

“Just join the track team, problem solved.” Minho suggests as he packs up. Thomas pretends that he doesn’t hear it. Newt chuckles.

“Okay, but we’re watching Black Mirror today.”

They end up on Thomas’ bed again, eating the same upsized burgers that drips oil onto the paper boxes while watching a boy wets his pants in an armed robbery on the screen.

  
**Eight**

  
The midterm examinations comes through the week like a trainwreck with Thomas attached to the rear end by a metal chain around his neck. Hopeless doesn’t even begin to describe how fucked he feels after his last paper ends. He doesn’t bother to count how many questions he left blank not because of the lack of time, but because he doesn’t even know what concepts the question was testing - the hallmark of a student on his way to repeating the module.

He’s face down on the bleachers when Minho and Newt return for their water break.

“Is he dead? Is he finally dead?” Minho asks, prodding Thomas’ limp body with his shoe and rubbing dirt on his jeans in the process. Thomas groans, a long and suffering sound, before he mumbles something unintelligibly.

“What did he say?”

“I think he told you to fuck off, mate.” Newt says, amused. Thomas points towards Newt in agreement.

“What’s up with him today? He’s looks extra done with life, and that’s saying something for him.”

Thomas turns his face, just enough to glare at Minho. “Says the one with only 2 midterm exams. I had to get my ass kicked repeatedly by 5 different papers.”

Minho nudges Newt with his elbow before he takes a big sip of water, “Talk some sense into him, Newt.”

Newt shrugs, “The professor did seem pretty pleased with himself. I mean, he must have been with the way he managed to fuck the entire cohort in 2 hours.”

Minho chokes on his water, Thomas laughs. From the corner of his eye, Thomas can see the guy with the evil looking eyebrows glaring at him again. Not them, just Thomas. Thomas’ laughter dies in his throat as the guy throws a dirty look over his shoulder as he walks back to the track.

“Who’s that?” Thomas says, eyes trained on the guy. Newt and Minho follow his gaze curiously.

“That’s Gally.” Minho wheezes in between his coughs, “He’s one of the better runners on our team.”

“That’s right. He has pretty impressive stamina.” Newt adds.

“I don’t think he likes me very much. He’s been giving me the evil stare since I first came here.”

“It’s not very nice to make fun of someone just because of his appearance, Tommy. I’m disappointed.”

“What? You think I’m shitting you? No, I shit you not. The look he gives promises an unsolved murder, Breaking Bad style, guys. He looks like he might actually murder me.”

“That’s great.” Minho sighs in relief before he catches the deadpan look from Newt, “Oh, I mean, uh, fuck.”

Newt sighs, shaking his head as he caps his bottle and sets it next to Thomas. “We can always go and eat something nice after training? A little mid-week pick-me-up?”

Thomas doesn’t really know what he was expecting Newt to say or do, but this was infinitely better than what he was expecting anyway. He actually brightens up at the thought of cheap takeout with a long night of Netflix and midnight shenanigans.

“That sounds great, actually.” Thomas agrees.

“So what are we eating?” Minho asks. Thomas’ smile falls slightly. Oh, right, Minho. Thomas kind of forgot that Minho was there, and truthfully he was expecting Minho not to join in either with how absent he has been the last 2 weeks. “Can we eat chinese takeout again?”

Newt hums thoughtfully. “I don’t mind.”

Thomas tries to shrug casually from his position on the bleachers, “Me neither.” he says, even though he would much rather have burgers and chicken tenders tonight.

The coach blows the whistle and Minho and Newt start heading back to the track with the other boys, but Minho looks over his shoulder at Thomas on his way back with an indecipherable look. Thomas turns his face back down on the bleachers, trying to ignore the way his stomach churns when he thinks of Minho’s expression.

  
**Nine**

  
Surprisingly, Newt arrives to lecture just a minute after Thomas - that is, 6 minutes after lecture began. Still, it’s a remarkable achievement considering that this is _Newt_.

“You’re early.” Thomas comments. Newt slides into the seat next to Thomas instead of his usual one a seat away, which leaves Thomas very confused and pleasantly surprised, although he tries not to dwell too much on it.

“Har de har har.” Newt replies dryly, sluggishly taking out his laptop that looks as done with life as its owner is. Or maybe it should be the other way round, that Newt finally looks the same as his laptop does. “Bloody hilarious, Tommy. Have you ever considered a career in stand up comedy?”

“I wasn’t being sarcastic, I meant it. You’re earlier than usual.”

Newt sighs heavily, fingers drumming against the table as he waits for his laptop to start noisily. “I couldn’t sleep last night, so I figured that I might as well turn up for lecture than to roll on my bed, again.”

“Why couldn’t you sleep? Do you have insomnia?”

“It’s going to sound ridiculous, but I ended training late last night and although most people would say that should tire me out enough to sleep well, it didn’t. I was so awake the entire night I managed to finish my readings for that philosophy module I regret taking.”

“Wait, you had training last night?” Thomas frowns in confusion, “Isn’t trainings only on Wednesdays?”

“Yeah, but then I got chosen to represent in a friendly meet 3 weeks from now, so they increased training days and intensity. I feel like someone could just rip my leg out of its socket right now.”

Thomas can see why Newt looks like shit then.

“That’s cool, though. You’re going to be in the _team_ team.”

Newt bites his lower lip, looking flustered. “Not the team team, I’m only an exchange student, that’s why I can only run in this friendly, not in the more important races.”

“But it’s still a cool thing, I’m happy for you, Newt.” Thomas says sincerely. He means it, he is happy for Newt being able to participate. He knows that Newt was faster than the rest, and although it sucks that Newt wouldn’t be able to represent the college in more important events, this was still something to be proud of.

Newt’s face goes through several expressions, of which the only few that Thomas could recognise were: shock, bashfulness, and finally settling on suppressed happiness. He can see the way Newt tried to set his lips in a thin line, but there was still a curve upwards at the end that he was unable to hide.

“I- Thanks, Tommy.” Newt says after a long pause, when his laptop stops making cracking sounds as it starts up. Newt is looking down at his faded keyboard as he speaks, too shy to meet Thomas’ stare. “It means a lot to me, hearing that from you.”

Thomas smiles at Newt; it’s a smile he feels blooming from the bottom of his heart, even if he doesn’t realise it at this moment.

He turns up at their Wednesday practice the next day, pointedly ignoring Gally’s glares while waiting patiently for Minho and Newt before they go back to watch more Netflix with too much chinese food in their laps.

  
**Ten**

  
Assignments and deadlines roll in like the wind through Thomas’ opened window.

“Cold.” Minho grits his teeth as he shuts the window stiffly, waddling back to his bed and burying himself under the covers. Thomas groans in agreement, curling into himself under his own blanket as he digs deeper into the mattress for more warmth.

They settle back into their respective beds for 5 minutes before it hits Thomas.

“Don’t you have lab this morning?”

Minho shoots up straight in his bed, hair all over the place with wide eyes opened painfully. If Thomas looks closer, he can see the redness in them.

“Fuck.” is the only word Minho breathes out before he gets ready in a blur of motions, out the door before Thomas even realises it. Which is great, because Thomas spent the entire night rushing for a deadline submission today, and all he really wants right now is to get a good sleep before he has to go for more lectures and tutorials.

Sadly, the peace and quiet doesn’t last long. Newt barrels through his door soon after Minho slams it shut.

“Tommy, wake up.”

Thomas rolls over to the other side, hoping that if he ignores Newt, Newt would eventually leave him alone. But Newt is nothing if not persistent.

“Tommy,” he says again, sitting on the edge of the bed shaking his friend awake, “wake up.”

Thomas sighs, resigned. He looks over his shoulder, squinting his eyes as they begin to adjust to the morning light streaming in through the half-open blinders. “What?” he croaks.

“I brought cake.” Newt says, pointing to a white container on his lap, “I baked it this morning.”

Baked it this morning? What time did Newt even have to be up to bake a cake and have it delivered at 8 in the morning? Jesus, how does this guy even sleep with all the submissions and trainings he goes for, much less have time to bake a cake?

But free food is free food, and Thomas is a student in debt.

Thomas pushes himself up on his elbows, struggling to get a view of the pound cake Newt baked.

“It’s supposed to be a banana cake, but I don’t think that I added enough bananas.”

“How do you even have the time to bake? Isn’t the deadline for the linear algebra assignment today?”

“Oh, I was done with that a few days ago.”

“What the fuck?” Thomas mutters, shaking his head.

“What? It’s like training for a meet, you don’t leave all of your practices to the day before and expect to win, do you? Same principle.”

Well, the only principle that Thomas had been living by was ‘if it isn’t the due date, it isn’t the do date’, but okay. Thomas shrugs, reaching out to pick a neatly cut piece from the tightly packed box. It’s still warm and moist, slightly crumbly at the top and soft in the middle. Thomas pops it in his mouth before he has time to judge its appearance, and _god_ , that has to be the worst tasting cake that Thomas has ever had the displeasure of eating in his miserable 19 years of existence. How can something that looks so promising turn out to be such shit? He nearly gags with how god awful the taste is, but when he catches the hopeful look on Newt’s face, he forces himself to close his mouth and smile.

“How is it?”

“It’s great.” Thomas coughs through his food. Newt’s smile falls.

“If it’s shit, you can just tell it to me. I’m not daft, Tommy, I can see the life drain out of your life as soon as you bit on it.”

Now Thomas feels like shit. Diffusion works fast.

“What life?” Thomas jokes, laughing at his own self-deprecating joke. Newt laughs as well, closing the box and putting it aside on the floor.

“Are you planning to go for tomorrow’s lecture?”

It takes a moment for Thomas to understand what Newt was talking about. “Huh? Oh, yeah. I think so, yeah.”

He doesn’t.

The next morning, Thomas finds that his body has miraculously gained a thousand pounds overnight, making it impossible to even roll out of bed. Truthfully though, it suits him well and he doesn’t find himself complaining about skipping lecture to sleep more. In fact, the only person who does complain about it is Newt.

Before Minho can even lift his bag up from the adjacent seat for Thomas, Newt says, “Fuck off, Tommy, you said you’d attend today’s lecture.”

“You skipped lecture?” Minho asks incredulously, “Who are you even?”

Thomas rolls his eyes, throwing himself onto the chair which screeches in protest, causing a few students around them to look up from their work and throw dirty looks at him.

“Okay, first of all, I said I think I would attend lecture. Keyword: think.”

“Clearly something you don’t do much of.” Minho snorts. Newt reaches across the table to give Minho a high-five, and Thomas wonders where he can get better friends.

“But you’re coming later, right?” Newt asks.

“What’s later?”

“Training.”

“Why would I go for your training?”

“To cheer me on.” Newt points out, “It is going to be the only race I can participate in anyway. Cheer for me, Tommy.”

_Cheer for me, Tommy_. Thomas tries not to think about how flustered he feels just by these 4 words alone.

“You know I don’t even do anything during your trainings.” Thomas frowns, reaching into his bag to take out his pencil case and semi-used textbooks. Sometimes he thinks that the only reason that he still lugs them around is just to prove a point to Newt, that he actually uses his money worth of books.

“Yeah, you don’t. But you’ll still turn up anyway.” Minho says confidently.

“No, I won’t. I’ll be studying in here.” Thomas retorts weakly. He already knows that he would end up at the bleachers with his notes in his hands, waiting for the consecutive three whistle blows that indicates the end of training and the beginning of dinner and stupid pointless arguments in his room. He doesn’t cheer for Newt or Minho aloud, but he does put his notes down every time he runs, watching with fervour.

  
**Eleven**

  
Thomas is freaking out because finals is a month away. Newt is freaking out because the friendly meet is a week away. And Minho is freaking out because he finally scored a date _date_ with Teresa.

“Since when did you even get the guts to talk to her?” Newt asks in wonder, eyes wide and mouth hanging open. Thomas looks between them, speechless with confusion.

“Since many weeks ago.”

“ _She_ was the one you ditched us for a date with?”

“I didn’t ditch you. Let’s be honest here, it didn’t seem like you guys had a bad night either. In fact, you looked pretty pleased and comfortable in his bed.” Minho quips.

Suddenly, images of Newt’s sleeping face floods Thomas’ mind and he can feel himself wilting with shame that he even remembers how Newt’s soft breaths sounded in the dead of the night.

“Guys, can we please focus?” Thomas says, feebly waving his notes in front of him.

“How can you not be offended by this, Tommy? I’m offended.” Newt smacks Thomas’ arm with the back of his palm lightly, “This bugger was hiding such a big secret, and he didn’t even introduce us to her yet.”

“That’s because I didn’t want to scare her off.” Minho cuts in, then adds as an afterthought, “No offense or anything.”

Thomas shrugs. He wants to be offended, he really really does, but he’s still too mortified by the fact that Minho remembers that night.

“I’ll introduce her to you guys at tomorrow’s training if you want.” Minho offers.

It’s only when Thomas is leaning against his bed pasting Toy Story plasters over his abrasions that he regrets not turning down Minho’s offer.

“Here.” Minho says, pushing a cold bottle of water in his hands towards Thomas, “Take it.”

“Thanks.” Thomas says gratefully, although lethargically. Minho sighs, obviously put off, as he sits himself next to his brooding best friend.

“What happened out there, Tom? I was talking to Teresa and the next thing I know Newt got punched by Gally real good?”

Thomas looks down, shamefully averting his gaze. He can feel the heat of Minho’s stare burn through his skull, though.

“It wasn’t Newt’s fault.”

“Yeah, I’ll say that.”

Thomas shrinks under Minho’s intense stare, tracing the lines of the bottle and watching as the little droplets of condensation roll down under his finger. He’s silent for a long time, thinking of how to explain himself, because this was going to be difficult to justify.

“I was waiting for your training to be over, as usual.” Thomas begins softly, hesitantly, “And as per normal, Newt came to drink water and sit around while we waited for you.”

_“Hey, good job.” Thomas says as Newt approaches with an outstretched arm. Thomas picks up Newt’s blue coloured plastic bottle and hands it over easily as Newt sits besides Thomas. After taking a few sips of water, Newt seems to register what Thomas had said and nods belatedly._

_“Thanks, but I’m still lacking a lot in time.” he says, bending over to massage his thighs._

_“You’ll do fine, Newt. You’ve practiced so much for this, you’re one of the best runners in the team.”_

_Newt snorts, “Nah, I’m just average.”_

_“No,” Thomas disagrees, shaking his head when he catches sight of Gally walking towards his bag a few feet away from them, “I mean, at least you’re way better than him. He runs like a fish.”_

_The words fly out of his mouth before he has the chance to think about what he’s saying, but he does have time to regret it when he sees Gally turn his head so slowly, so intimidatingly that he nearly shits himself right there and then._

_Gally furrows his brows, “What did you say?”_

_“Nothing.” Thomas says quickly, but Gally stalks closer, the fury on his face growing as he gets closer and closer. There is not a shred of doubt in his eyes; Gally knows what he heard, and he is mad._

_“You said I run like a fish, didn’t you?”_

_“No.” Thomas denies, standing up and backing away. Newt stands up as well, but instead of walking away like Thomas, Newt inches forward with both hands in front of him, as if he was trying to placate a dangerous animal._

_“Gally.” Newt says in a warning tone, eyeing his movements. Gally pays no attention to Newt, shoving him away roughly as he continues walking towards Thomas._

_“You lying fucker, I’ll have you know that I’ve been here for 3 years, and you have the audacity to make fun of my running?” Gally barks, “A stupid loner freshman like you? What the fuck do you know about running and being in a team?”_

_Then something in Thomas snaps. Instead of backing off, Thomas stands his ground and tilts his head upwards to meet Gally’s angry stare._

_“Yeah? I may be a stupid loner freshman, but I’m not the one trying to pick a fight because of how fucking insecure I am about my abilities!”_

_And then Gally raises a clenched fist, ready to strike Thomas right smack in the middle of his face. Thomas shuts his eyes tightly, getting ready for the hit when he’s promptly shoved aside. Instead of feeling an impact on his face, he feels it on his palms as he falls gracelessly against the tracks. Then he hears a loud “twack” before someone else falls across from him._

_It’s Newt, clutching onto his face. Thomas stares, paralysed by shock. The longer he stares, the more an angry red bruise begins to bloom on Newt’s cheek. Newt pushed him away. Newt took the blow._

_He doesn’t hear the yelling until someone is shaking him._

_“Tom, are you hurt?”_

_Thomas shakes the fog out of his mind, blinking blearily at Minho before he remembers that he isn’t the injured one, Newt is. “Newt.” Thomas says with difficulty. “Newt’s injured.”_

_When Thomas turns back, there’s a lean girl with long brown hair helping Newt up. He manages to stand for approximately a second before he’s collapsing on one side, crying in pain._

_“My ankle.” is all Newt says. Thomas’ stomach falls._

“What the fuck, Thomas.” Minho says after Thomas is done recounting what had happened. Thomas remains still. Yeah, he deserved whatever was coming. “You picked a fight with Gally for no reason, and got him suspended from the meet next week.”

“W-Wait, what?” Thomas stammers, “Suspended?”

“Yeah, suspended as in not allowed to take part in the meet next week.” Minho clarifies bitingly, “And Newt sprained his ankle badly, unlikely to recover by next week.”

Oh, fuck.

“So basically, we are fucked for next week. Thanks, Tom.”

Thomas never expected for things to turn out so badly. He never expected Newt to take the hit for him, he never expected Newt put himself in harm's way when he had been so excited for the friendly meet next week. He never expected to hurt Newt. But fuck, he did anyway, and he doesn’t know what to do to make it up to Newt.

But then an idea hits him. Thomas doesn’t know if it’ll work, but even a shot in the dark is better than nothing right now.

“Hey, what if I join the team and help to run for Newt in the race as his replacement?”

Minho looks up from his hands with incredulity, “What?”

“I mean, you need runners, am I right?”

“Yeah, and?”

“What if I replaced Newt in his races?”

Minho stares at Thomas with narrowed eyes, thinking so hard that Thomas can almost see the cogs in his head moving with difficulty. When Minho still doesn’t say anything, Thomas begins to worry that maybe his suggestion was stupid and simply not feasible.

“I don’t know, I could suggest it to Alby and see what he says.” Minho says at last. Finally, it feels like a huge weight was just lifted off Thomas’ chest.

“Yeah.” Thomas heaves. He desperately hopes for a favourable reply so that he can start to make up for being the biggest asshole in the world to the friend who deserved so much better than he got.

  
**Twelve**

  
Newt doesn’t turn up for lecture, nor does he turn up for their study sessions. But with the amount of work and impromptu trainings he’s drowning in, he doesn’t have much time or energy to really worry about it until the day of the friendly.

Thomas is stretching at the side of the tracks with the rest of the team, led by Alby. But he keeps looking back at the bleachers, waiting to see a mess of blonde hair from somewhere.

“Focus, Tom.” Minho says. Thomas turns back quickly, slightly embarrassed for being caught daydreaming.

He shouldn’t keep wondering where Newt is, or if the man is even going to show up to watch, but he can’t help it. He’s worried. He hasn’t seen a single trace of Newt since last week when Gally punched him, and although he probably should have paid Newt a visit, he was still ashamed that the root of the problem stems from him.

Thomas sighs, closing his eyes before opening it slowly. He has a lot of making up to do, and hopefully this can help.

The rest of the day passes in a blur. A briefing, more briefings, and then finally, they can begin.

Thomas watches the rest of the races with trepidation that he might not be able to do his best, or maybe that they won’t win even if he does his best. But he really wants to win this race, not just for his own pride, but mostly because he wants to win this for Newt. The thought keeps him tensed the entire day, keeps the adrenaline pulsing through his veins so much so that even at the starting line, Thomas feels more than ready to just _go_ already.

So when the horn blows, Thomas runs, and it is the best he’s felt the entire week. His legs don’t feel like legs with how weightless they are, and the air against his face doesn’t feel like resistance with how they egg him on to be faster, and the finish line doesn’t seem like a goal, it seems like home.

For some reason, Thomas turns to look at the bleachers, and then he sees it. The mess of blonde hair flying in the wind, probably because the hair tie was too loose and Newt wouldn’t spend even a dollar on buying new ones. Newt would most likely end up with tangles in his hair, like he always did at the end of every training when he would cry about it to Thomas.

Newt watches Thomas with an unreadable expression, and that’s all Thomas can see before he turns back and sprints past the finish line.

Thomas runs a bit more, slowing into a jog and eventually just walking before he turns around to look at the bleachers again. He’s just in time to see Newt limping away, in the direction of the exit.

  
**Thirteen**

  
When Newt remains absent for lecture and their study sessions, Thomas gets worried. But he doesn’t talk share his worry with Minho, because that also creates another worry that not only will Minho think that his concerns are unfounded, but also start to question why Thomas keeps thinking of their friend, and that is not something Thomas wants to talk about at the moment.

But Minho notices the way that Thomas absentmindedly drums his fingers on the table anyway, flicking his pen back and forth on the textbook in front of him.

“God, if you’re so worried about him, just go and _talk_ to him already.” Minho chides, rolling his eyes as he removes the neon blue highlighter from between his teeth. Thomas frowns at him, besides the fact that Minho just read his mind, Thomas also just realised that that highlighter was in fact his, now tainted with Minho’s saliva. That’s kind of disgusting.

“Who?” Thomas asks, playing dumb. Minho rolls his eyes again.

“Newt. You know, the guy who you have a mind blowingly obvious crush on?”

Thomas almost chokes and falls off his chair. “W-What?” he sputters, looking around the library to see if anyone overheard what Minho had said.

“Yeah, it isn’t very discreet, _Tommy_ boy.” Minho continues with an unimpressed look.

“Wait. So you mean -” Thomas licks his lip nervously, not sure of how to phrase his words, but deciding to just fuck it and say it, “- you _know_?”

“Know? That what? You’re bisexual? Uh, yeah, I’ve known since I saw you stare at my teammates back in high school, Tom. That wasn’t the kind of look you give to people you don’t have some kind of interest in.”

“That could just mean that I’m gay, though.”

“Nah, you dated Brenda for a while back then, remember?”

“Oh, right.” Thomas leans away from Minho, not realising how close they had moved until now, “I almost forgot.”

Minho snorts, “So just go and talk to Newt already. Jesus, watching you pining is such a painful thing that I’d rather actually study for my finals.”

Thomas sighs, there was no denying that he did look kind of pitiful moping around Minho recently.

“Also, his laptop is busted. So you know, if you’re looking for a shot at redemption, here it is.” Minho adds offhandedly.

Busted his laptop? Oh, shit, Thomas thinks, that laptops is basically Newt’s lifeline in college. Textbooks, tutorials, assignments.. everything was on that piece of crap that Newt carried everywhere. He can’t even imagine the emotional turmoil Newt must be in right now, trying to collate all his materials in time for finals revision.

And that’s how Thomas ends up hogging the photocopy machine the entire night, photocopying every relevant page of his expensive textbook as well as all his tutorial notes and assignments for Newt. He makes himself a few cups of coffee as the night draws on into the ass crack of dawn, the dark sky fading into lilac by the time he’s done.

He mourns the loss of sleep and productive time he could be having, but he wants to help Newt like the man has helped him throughout the entire semester. So he sucks it up as he staples stacks of paper together and packs them neatly in a file, finally finding the courage to knock on Newt’s door. The first time he knocks, there is no answer, there is not even a sound that anyone was inside. So Thomas knocks again, and again, and again, and then before he can knock again, the door is wretched open with an extremely pissed off Newt. With the amount of force the door was opened with, Thomas is partly surprised that the hinges are still attached.

“What the fuck do you want at this hour, Thomas?”

Ouch, Thomas. Thomas feels his short lived courage drain out of him under the heat of Newt’s glare. He doesn’t understand how someone in baggy shirt and pants with bed hair could look so threatening, but here is Newt.

Thomas reaches into his bag, unsurely pulling out the file and putting it in front of him, as if it would protect him from Newt’s wrath.

“I heard about your laptop.” he explains meekly.

Newt looks at the file, then at Thomas, then back at the file. It takes a few seconds more before Newt reaches out to take the file, flipping through its contents confusedly.

“These are the materials for linear algebra.”

“Yeah.”

“You basically photocopied everything.”

“Yeah.”

“This is illegal. You’re only allowed to photocopy 10% of the book.”

“Yeah. I know.”

Newt looks up from between his messy hair covering his eyes, searching for something in Thomas’ eyes. For a long moment, Thomas worries about what Newt might do. Would he shut the door? Would he get angry at Thomas?

But then Newt pushes the papers back into the file and tucks it safely under his armpit, leaning against the doorframe with an expectant look. Thomas wishes he knew what Newt was waiting for instead of standing outside like a lame duck. He tries to loosen his stance and sneak a glance at Newt’s ankle. Well, it doesn’t look swollen anymore, which is great, but he isn’t sure that it’s completely healed yet.

It doesn’t hurt to ask.

“How’s your foot?”

Newt glances down, moving his foot in circles. “It’s not a 100% yet, but it’s getting there.”

“I’m sorry. I wish I had backed down, then you wouldn’t have gotten hit.”

“Yeah, getting punched by a respectable teammate wasn’t exactly something I had on my bucket list either.”

Thomas’ eyes trail off to Newt’s cheeks, a slight purple on his cheekbones is the only evidence that that happened. Thomas worries his lower lip between his teeth.

“I’m sorry.”

“Apology accepted.” Newt says after a beat, sounding somewhat pleased. When Thomas hears this, he dares to look up and finds himself looking at a smiling Newt. It’s only then that he realises how much he missed this smile, reassuring and understanding. “Congrats on winning your race, by the way.”

Thomas flushes, “We lost overall, though.”

“You still won your race, is all I’m saying.”

“Could have been your victory.”

Newt shrugs casually, pushing the door open wider with his unhurt foot and allowing Thomas a better glimpse into his sparse room. It’s dark - understandably so, for someone who was sleeping moments before Thomas rudely interrupted it - but very empty, almost as if it was unlived-in. “I guess I should be a good host and invite you in. Do you want to come in?”

Thomas regards Newt carefully, “Only if you’re okay with that.”

“There’s almost nothing valuable to steal from me, so that’s not a concern.” Newt says, stepping back to let Thomas in, “Gotta warn you though, it’s not the most comfortable place to be in.”

Thomas shrugs as he slips his shoes off, closing the door quietly behind him. If it looked empty from the outside, it felt even more so inside. To the side of the room were 2 small luggages and a pile of neatly folded clothes, and on the table were some papers messily strawn all over. If not for the simple white bedsheet with a crumpled blanket shoved to the side, it would have been too easy to mistake this for a vacant room.

As if sensing Thomas’ mild discomfort, Newt chimes in, “Told ya. Wasn’t going to be comfortable.”

Thomas shakes his head, “It’s okay, I didn’t come in because I expected a lot anyway.”

“So why did you come in?”

“Because you’re my friend that I haven’t seen in a while, and I missed you.” Thomas says honestly. There was no point lying; even if he did, he had a feeling that Newt would have known anyway. Newt always has an uncanny way of knowing how Thomas feels.

The words take a moment to register in Newt’s sleep-muddled mind, but when they do, a sweet and gentle smile forms on that pair of cracked lips.

“You’re such a sap.” Newt says dismissively, even though Thomas knows what he really means is ‘me too’. And somehow, just hearing those words at 7 in the morning makes him feel like it didn’t matter if everything was still a mess, it didn’t matter that he didn’t know what he was doing right now, because he was with Newt, and that made everything infinitely better.

  
**Fourteen**

  
Thomas wants to die. He really really wants to die. Who said putting lectures at 8AM was legal?

It’s the last lecture of the semester, and the lecture theatre is the emptiest that he’s ever seen it. Even with a double shot coffee steaming away next to his face, Thomas regrets dragging his ass out of his cozy bed. He could have been in bed instead of watching the lecturer drone on and on about finals and recaps, but here he is with other equally miserable-looking students struggling to keep their eyes open. At least he isn’t like the girl behind him, already snoozing away.

To be honest though, he’s not too far from that situation. Thomas is nodding away, jerking awake painfully everytime and trying to shake the sleep away when Newt slides into the next seat, looking equally exhausted. His hair is up in that messy bun that looks a few seconds away from giving way, and the bags under his eyes have become much more visible than they were weeks ago, especially contrasting against his pale skin.

Newt breathes out slowly before he turns to Thomas.

“Did I miss anything important?”

“The lecturer talked about finals and started to do a recap on the key concepts we should know for the exam.”

“Nothing important then.” Newt replies easily with a playful smile, as he takes out stacks of photocopied textbook pages and miscellaneous notes.

And if the laugh that Thomas makes wakes the girl behind him, he doesn’t know nor does he care. For the first time, he nods in agreement, feeling the warmth in his belly spread to his chest and echo in his laughter.

  
**Fifteen**

  
Thomas has one week to get his shit together and one shot to salvage his mediocre grades. The pressure is mounting and pouring over, and Thomas feels just about ready to break down and tear his hair out by now.

Minho’s tapping his pen away across the table, bobbing his head to the music blasting out of his earpiece. Thomas doesn’t know how Minho studies with his music cranked up that loud, but as someone who is unable to study with noise distractions, Minho has been a downright nuisance.

Newt eyes Thomas worriedly, tapping on his arm and nodding his head towards the exit.

_Break?_

Thomas can count the number of times he’s had a break today on one hand with a few missing fingers, so he gratefully and readily accepts the invitation to just get out of the suffocating room. Minho barely spares them a glance before he’s back to his notes, highlighting the entire paragraph with what was Thomas’ blue highlighter.

Once they’re out of the library, Thomas shivers when a cold blast of wind hits them. Newt whistles lowly.

“How are you feeling today, Tommy?”

“Right on the verge of losing my mind.” Thomas says through clenched teeth, trying to fight the urge to run back into the warm library, “The stress associated with studying for finals is almost equivalent to the total stress I endured in high school.”

Newt laughs loudly in that deep breathy way he always does, without a care in the world. “Yeah, you’ll get used to it eventually.”

“Are you not stressed at all?”

Newt wrinkles his nose, half confused and half amused. “I am stressed, just not as much as I used to be when I was in year 1.”

“Why not? What changed?”

Newt shrugs, walking towards the vending machine and slotting in a few coins. He punches the button for a can of warm coffee, waiting for the can to roll out before he turns back to Thomas.

“It’s just a degree, Thomas.” Newt replies, “Getting a bad grade now might feel like the end of the world, but if you think about it, that’s how we felt in high school too. I guess when you look at the bigger picture, no one will really remember or care about that module you got a C for. But you only get to live this life once, so why not make the most out of it by trying new things and doing what you love?”

Thomas shuffles his feet, letting Newt’s words sink in. Newt walks back as he opens the can with practiced ease, taking a long sip from it before offering the can to Thomas. Thomas stares at it before he takes it, cupping his hands around the warm can.

“I guess you’re right, but it doesn’t make me feel less scared than I am now.”

“What’re you scared of?”

Thomas sighs, looking up at the cloudy sky before he takes a small sip of coffee. “I don’t know, I guess I’m scared of disappointing my parents with my subpar results. Scared of disappointing myself as well.”

Newt smiles sympathetically, walking close enough to Thomas that their arms touch.

“I think what you should always keep in mind is that your grades do not define who you are. You’re a multifaceted person with many talents, and I believe that you are more than what you think of yourself.”

Thomas knows this. He’s been trying to convince himself of this. Yet, hearing it from Newt gave him the reassurance he never knew he could have, and a calm fell over him.

“Thanks, Newt. It means a lot to me, hearing that from you.” Thomas mumbles, feeling the surge of confidence pulsing through his veins and into the tips of his toes. Newt smiles back as he tries blows away a stray strand of hair from his forehead, although to no avail. Thomas chuckles quietly to himself, reaching out to tuck away that strand of hair behind Newt’s warm ears.

His hair was soft to the touch, the light in Newt’s eyes were the brightest he’s remembered them to be, and the way his heart beat in his chest were the hardest he ever felt.

  
**Sixteen**

  
Finals come and goes much faster than Thomas remembers. It was by no means a breeze, but with Newt losing his mind across him in the library, he doesn’t feel so alone in his suffering. And sometimes when they look up at the same time, the encouraging smile that Newt gives is enough motivation for Thomas to grit his teeth and press on in his academic struggles.

By the end of Thomas’ last paper, Minho and Newt are already long done with their finals.

“So what do we do now?” Minho asks with half of his body hanging off his bed. Newt shrugs from Thomas’ bed, laying on his stomach flipping through a tourist brochure.

“Let’s go sightseeing.” Newt suggests, picking up the brochure as he rolls over on his back, “I want to visit the Grand Canyon.”

“That’s all the way in Arizona, Newt.” Thomas argues.

Newt raises himself on his elbows to give Thomas a shrewd look, “Do you even have anything planned for the holidays?”

Okay, Newt got him. Thomas and Minho share a look before Minho sighs resignedly.

“Where else do you have in mind? Let’s make a list and start planning.”

In all honesty, the impromptu trip across US didn’t go as disastrously as Thomas thought it would. In fact, Thomas could safely say that he enjoyed the time spent with Minho and Newt very much, even if they were working on a ridiculously tight budget and ended up missing a few buses which led to delays and even more delays in their trip. But it was during these in between moments that Thomas found the most joy in, laughing at their bad luck and making the best out of a bad situation. It was then that he really realised the value of a passing moment, that the best memories were always created in the moments that he thought were mundane. Even if it meant being stuck in the snow, or having to buy cheap coffee that tasted more like piss than anything else, Thomas found himself laughing about it at the end of the day with Minho and Newt.

Thomas really wished that time would freeze for a moment and let him remember everything as it is: the way that Minho’s calloused hands clapped his back, the way that Newt leaned in closer to Thomas on the bus and the way that his long and thin blonde strands of hair tickled his nose. But time flows linearly, and it doesn’t stop for anyone.

The night before Newt flies back home, the 3 of them settle in for what is left of the short night. Minho, being the first of them to bathe, is already fast asleep on his bed at the end of the room. Thomas is lounging on the bed, swiping through messages and deleting the stupid memes that Minho sent during their toilet breaks.

Newt comes out of the shower after a few minutes with his hair still dripping wet, the little droplets of water creating a damp patch of cloth that stuck to his lanky frame. Newt strolls out, roughly drying the top of his head with a white towel and creating a mess of his hair.

“Don’t do that, you’ll tangle your hair.” Thomas chastises, beckoning Newt to him. Newt rolls his eyes as he falls on the bed next to Thomas.

“Says the one with the short hair.”

“That’s why my hair is short - I don’t like having to invest extra effort into maintaining my good hair. You on the other hand..” Thomas trails off, shaking his head as he swats away Newt’s hand, taking the towel into his hands and rolling it out carefully. Newt watches with fascination as Thomas gently rubs the towel against his hair, patting it down dry. They fall into a comfortable silence with Thomas drying Newt’s hair, and Newt slowly leaning back until the back of his head rests against Thomas’ chest.

“I can’t believe that I’m flying back tomorrow.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.” Newt nods, the motion causing his hair to be pulled in the opposite direction and slipping out of Thomas’ grasp. “It feels so surreal.”

“Are you looking forward to going home?”

“I guess I should be, but I’m having a bit of mixed feelings.” Newt says more to himself than to Thomas, staring up at the ceiling blankly, “I think that it would be weird to wake up in my bed again, and wonder if this entire exchange experience was just a wonderful dream I dreamt up.”

Thomas’ smile turns wistful as his motions slow, “Yet I’m sitting right behind you trying to save your hair from irreparable damage. You couldn’t have dreamt this up.”

“Yeah, probably not.” Newt laughs weakly, leaning down against Thomas’ chest so that he could look at him from below, “I think that I’ll miss this. Everything. The study sessions, the chinese food and fast food junk while arguing over TV series, and waking up to Minho’s horrible teeth grinding sound.”

“So just Minho then?”

Newt laughs again, more genuinely this time, “You don’t make those teeth grinding sounds, do you?”

“I should hope not. I wouldn’t know - I’m asleep.”

“Fair enough.” Newt acquiesced, closing his eyes. Thomas hums, going back to patting Newt’s hair dry. It takes a while longer before Newt says with a melancholic look on his face, “And you too.”

“Hmm?”

“I’ll miss you too, Tommy.” Newt closes his eyes again, taking in a slow breath, “You know what the best part of those 8AM lectures were?”

“Was there even a good part?” Thomas laughs.

Newt clicks his tongue in mock annoyance, but the smile on his lips betrays him. Newt waits until a hush falls over them again before he whispers, so delicately, “You were always the best part.”

“Just those 8AM lectures?”

Newt chuckles, shaking his head minutely, “And ending trainings, and studying, and everything else in between. All of them. You were always the best part, you always made it worth it.”

Once again, Thomas’ ministrations slow to a stop. There’s always been a loose thread at the edge of his heart, waiting for someone to pull on it and unravel the contents he tried to keep a secret. And here is Newt, carefully undoing the messy stitches with utmost care and tenderness, and Thomas lets him.

“Me too.” Thomas confesses softly, hanging his head to face Newt. When Newt opens his eyes with a sharp clarity in them, Thomas knows that this is where he wants to be every day, and what a shame it was that he found this out so late.

Newt reaches up to clasp Thomas’ face within his palms gently, thumbs swiping over his cheeks, his touch like a feather. And in that moment, Thomas knew as well. No words were exchanged, no words were needed. Thomas allowed himself to be pulled in, letting their foreheads touch with both their eyes closed in a moment of serenity.

 

The weight in Thomas’ heart grows as he watches Newt take his passport out, looking up to them with a regretful smile. Minho and Thomas stare at Newt, who stares back at them wordlessly. Thomas half expects Newt to be the first to break the silence, but surprisingly it is Minho who makes the first move.

Minho closes the distance between them, pulling Newt into a tight hug as he groans, “Fuck, I’m going to miss you so much.”

Newt laughs, hugging Minho back tightly. “I’ll miss you too, you stupid bugger.”

“Fuck off.” Minho says, releasing Newt from his vice grip. In the usual Minho style, he slaps Newt painfully hard on the arm, but immune to the pain by now, Newt just laughs again as he slaps Minho back.

Thomas watches the scene with a heavy heart. He wasn’t sure how he felt about sending Newt back home. He knew that he’d miss Newt a lot, that was for sure. But there was a smaller part of him that knew that he’d miss Newt more than a friend, no matter how unwilling he was to admit that out loud.

But here was his last chance at anything.

Newt approaches Thomas slowly, his bright smile falling into something more subdued.

“Heya, Tommy boy.” Newt says.

“Nude.” Thomas answers after a beat.

“Thanks for being the first friend I made here. I never mentioned it because it sounds so lame, but yeah, my exchange experience was great. And I think that a large part of it was thanks to you.”

Thomas isn’t really sure how he should reply to that, so he swallows thickly and nods.

“Take care of yourself, Tommy. Don’t give up and have faith.”

“Yeah. You too.” Thomas says stiffly. They smile cordially at each other for a long second before Newt mumbles something unintelligible under his breath and grabs Thomas in a hug. Thomas leans in awkwardly before he realises what is happening and relaxes into the embrace, hands holding onto Newt’s back.

Yeah, Thomas will really miss Newt.

When they let go, Newt gives Thomas a small smile along with a pat on the shoulder.

“We’ll keep in contact.” Newt promises the both of them, Minho nods next to Thomas.

“Take care.”

“Yeah.” Newt says, “I’ll see you guys.”

And then Newt turns around, lugging his bags behind him towards the check-in counters. Thomas and Minho watch in silence as Newt begins to walk towards the departure hall, Minho looking unusually stoic while Thomas with a sick feeling in his gut.

Suddenly, Minho nudges Thomas with his elbow.

“Don’t you have something that you want to tell Newt before he goes?”

Thomas blinks, momentarily disoriented, “What?”

“You know - I don’t know - your feelings?”

“What if he rejects me?”

“Does it really matter? You might never see him again. If he rejects you, you can take the distance as a way to get over him. If he doesn’t then, well, that’s great. But either way, don’t you think that you should at least give it a shot?”

And then he _gets_ it. This is his last chance, the open window was closing in rapidly and he knew without a doubt that he would regret it so much if he had never tried to seize the opportunity.

So Thomas does what he’s best at: he runs.

“Newt! Newt!”

Newt looks over his shoulder with a questioning look, “Tommy?”

Thomas skids to a stop right in front of Newt, catching his breath before he straightens up and looks Newt in the eye. “Newt, I have to tell you something.”

Newt nods tentatively, and it is enough encouragement for Thomas to go on.

“Newt, I think that I might like you a bit more than a friend should. I think I might like _like_ you, and I know it’s horribly unfair of me to spring this on you right now, but I couldn’t let you go without letting you know this. And I’m not expecting you to give me an answer right now, but I hope that you could consider giving us a chance. Because I think I might really like you, and I want us to try this.”

Gingerly, Thomas reaches out to lace their fingers together. Newt looks down with a carefully blank expression, some blond locks falling from behind his ears and partially covering his face.

“So, if you’d like to try this as well, maybe you could give me a sign once you get back.”

“I’m not good with distance, Thomas.”

“It doesn’t have to be anything yet, we could just see how things go and where we can go from there.” Thomas says quickly in what he hopes is a reassuring tone, “I won’t force you into anything you don’t want, but maybe you could just give it a thought?”

Newt blinks blearily, “Okay.” he says softly. “I will think about it, Tommy.”

 

So Thomas waits. And he waits. And he waits.

When the new semester rolls in, when Thomas joins the track team for good, when Minho and Teresa get into an exclusive relationship, Thomas is still waiting, but with dwindling hope.

“Maybe I should forget about him and move on.” Thomas muses to himself during his weekly jog with Minho. Minho glances at Thomas before looking back ahead of him.

“What? Why?”

“It’s been months, Minho.” Thomas pants, “I just think that if he was interested, he would have contacted me by now, you know?”

Minho shoots him a sympathetic look, “Well, maybe he’s busy adjusting back to life in Britain or something. Just give it a bit more time before you call it quits.”

Thomas sighs, coming out as a harsher pant. He really doesn’t want to wait any longer. Everyday that he wakes up and goes to sleep with no new messages received is another day that he dies a bit more inside, and he just wants to forget how he made himself so vulnerable to another person only to get ghosted like this. It hurts so much. But Minho said to give it a bit more time, and Minho is the one with a relationship, so Thomas listens to his advice.

Which, on hindsight, was the best thing that Thomas ever did. As he walks back into their dorm room a week after that jog, he throws himself on his bed and begins his daily routine of procrastination starting with checking his messages on his phone.

As he scrolls through the junk spam messages, he notices a foreign number amongst the mess. He has to suppress the hope that begins to blossom in his chest until he confirms it. +44 is in fact Britain’s country code.

Thomas quickly opens the message with his body as tensed as a violin string.

 

I’m sorry I took so long. I told you that I wasn’t good with distance.

 

For the first time in a long time, Thomas laughs again, and he can feel it in his chest, his heart and his soul. It’s exactly 7:45PM on a cloudy evening that Thomas meets Newt again, in a different plane, in a different light.

 

You told me to have faith, and I did.


End file.
